lead centered=”no”The COVID-19 Cyber Threat Intelligence League and other groups cooperate with the industry, law enforcement, and the government to prevent attacks on healthcare providers./lead

Last month, some of the usual cast of online scammers and malware miscreants promised to refrain from attacking healthcare organizations or exploiting them during the COVID-19 crisis, showing a sense of honor unexpected from ransomware attackers and cryptocurrency thieves.

However, this ceasefire turned out to be a head-fake. Within a week of those vows, malware purveyors and con artists rushed to send out phishing emails while masquerading as healthcare organizations and even launched attacks against hospitals and other critical facilities. Last week, Google alone was blocking 18 million COVID-19 phishing or malware-delivery emails per day.

One group of esteemed hackers and cybersecurity experts couldn’t stand idly by and watch cybercriminals take advantage of this unprecedented crisis or, even worse, damage overtaxed and much-needed healthcare facilities. So, Marc Rogers, head of sec ops for DEF CON and VP of cybersecurity strategy for Okta; Nate Warfield, senior security program manager at Microsoft; Chris Mills, also a key security player at Microsoft; and Ohad Zaidenberg, lead cyber intelligence researcher at Clearsky Cyber Security, formed the COVID-19 Cyber Threat Intelligence League (CTI League).

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